


Blueprints

by bonibaru



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-23
Updated: 2017-03-23
Packaged: 2018-10-09 11:11:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10410855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonibaru/pseuds/bonibaru
Summary: Plans change.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "picture is worth a thousand words" challenge. My assigned picture was a photograph of the blueprints of a house. I got close, lol.

She wakes up these days to the smell of bacon frying and the snap crackle sizzling sound of everyday life. The routine goes like this: quick hot shower, quick hot coffee with plenty of cream and sugar, and Dawn spending an inordinate amount of time scolding her for not eating enough. Daily workouts, adrenaline rush, fast healing - these things burn calories; Slayers, with a heightened metabolism, can eat as much as they want whenever they want. Dawn doesn't see how Buffy eats enough to even keep going. But it's been a long time since she's felt any desire to pig out. She eats when someone puts food in front of her, but there's always so much else to do now that the most mundane of activities - like breakfast - barely registers on her radar.

Xander brings her lunch in the training room when she completely forgets to eat, which is nearly every day. She's glad to see Xander getting along so well with Vi. He always did have a thing for shy-but-strong redheads with cute hats.

She smiles at the thought as she makes her way into the shower and gropes blindly through the steam for shampoo, conditioner, lavender soap. Being a Slayer - no longer The Slayer, but A Slayer - means no longer having to rush through the nuances of personal grooming, a luxury she has long waited for. She had always kept her hair longer because it was easier to sweep up into a ponytail or under a hat, minimal fuss, maximal time to slay. There is time now for a V05 hot oil treatment if she wants to have one, because finally the weight of the world is off her shoulders and spread out over all the far reaches of the planet. But outside of the steamy fiberglass walls, she keeps as busy as she can, just the same. Keeping herself busy means not having enough time to get lost in memories.

This is what growing up means, what being a leader is: instead of a living room full of weak, scared, untrained Potentials she now has an almost-built training hall full of strong, scared, untrained Slayers.

And she has so much more than time, now. She has Xander, overseeing the construction of the buildings and keeping everything on schedule. She has Willow and Faith, using computers, Slayer prescience and magic mojo to track the newbies down. She has Robin and Kennedy out in the field, putting girls into planes, trains and automobiles all bound for England and the start of a new life. She has Giles running the business end of things, making sure the Joyce Summers Memorial Boarding School for Girls is a legitimate enterprise on the books, and keeping them supplied with the necessities: weapons, spell ingredients, food, feminine hygiene products (which still never fails to make him blush).

They have what's left of the Watchers Council to train the brains of the now Slayers, increasing their knowledge base with daily studies while she works on their muscles, their balance, their aim, and the courage of their hearts. She has Angel and Wesley and Fred and Gunn and Lorne in LA, keeping their ears to the ground and sending any foundlings her way when the Wolfram and Hart teams find them before Willow can. Add all of these together and they're building a new life for the new girls and for each other, laying a solid foundation for a new era in the fight against evil, yadda yadda. It's the perfect blueprint for one big, happy - and only slightly dysfunctional - global family, industriously rebuilding an ancient legacy from the ground up.

Everything is moving along smoothly. She dries off, dresses, combs out her hair, and walks down the hallway toward the stairs. The long-term plans are laid out neatly, precisely, and each day has a nice comfortable rhythm to it.

So when she comes down for breakfast and finds The Vampire Formerly Known as William the Bloody standing next to a white-faced Willow in the middle of her kitchen, bright-eyed and dazed, and fucking corporeal, it throws her completely out of balance.

His skin is warm; it's the first thing she notices. Not the color or length or curl of his hair, nor the crisp white clothing They've seen fit to dress him in as some sort of cosmic anvil. When she reaches out her hand to touch the side of his face, somewhere in the back of her mind she expects him to feel cool. And he doesn't. When he puts his hand over hers and closes his eyes, his fingers are as long and slender and solid as she remembers - and a temperate ninety-eight point six degrees. With a pulse fluttering gently under the skin.

She doesn't know exactly what this is supposed to mean, but she doesn't realize she's asked it aloud until Willow answers.

"I think," the redhead says slowly, turning a familiar amulet over and over between her fingers, "it means the plans have changed."


End file.
